Ghosts

First Act

When I was six years old I spent two weeks at my grandparents house, my parents being away on vacation with my two older brothers. I used to cry every night before falling asleep. This wasn’t because I didn’t enjoy my time there, but simply because I had realized for the first time in my life, that no matter what I do, I too will die in the end. This realization was probably the result of living with this old couple, whereas up until then my visits to their house only lasted an hour or two. Since then I constantly think about death, or rather, about growing old. My grandma, closing in on her 90th birthday, is slowly realizing that I was right to cry, and my grandpa already knows it for sure.

Second Act

After his death, my mother complained that she wasn’t able to dream about him. She wanted desperately to see him again, you see, perhaps some unfinished business, or probably because that with his death she felt like daddy’s little girl again. I wasn’t the closest family member to my grandfather, that’s for sure, but for some reason I was granted first “visitation rights”. I find it very difficult to put this dream into words, especially because only two words had been uttered throughout it, though the scene itself must have lasted a good minute or two:

I saw him as I was walking down the street from my folks’ house towards the local shopping center; he was stepping out of the front doors, wearing a bright yellow sweater and not looking any younger than he was in death, but somewhat healthier; the skin of his face tighter, more tanned, as if in the last six weeks of his artificially-prolonged life the ceiling of the hospital room didn’t see his face more than the sun did. Another mental note I made, was that he wasn’t using his walking-cane. But all of that didn’t matter anyway – this man was obviously not my dead grandpa.

Nevertheless, what can you do when you see something that cannot be? I reckon you don’t believe that a man can fly any more than I do, but if one simply did it in front of your eyes, for real – could you not believe what you see? could you stop knowing what you already know? this would be like not knowing that the sun will rise tomorrow.
And so, as I was approaching him, noticing all the details I just mentioned – his clothes, his face, his walk – I realized I was actually walking towards my deceased grandfather. he, apparently, was conscious of the situation, so he didn’t share my absolute shock and as I passed him, shoulder to shoulder, he suddenly grabbed mine, turned me around and said: tell grandma… and then he put two fingers to his lips and blew out a kiss.

I was stunned; for me this was really happening and I reacted as I probably would have, if I’d seen a man fly, or worse – my dead grandpa walking down the street. I started gasping, fell down to my knees and started weeping and at that point woke up in my bed, which was then in Philadelphia.
I had all the symptoms you could easily guess: cold sweat, speeding heart-rate and a full, detailed memory of the dream. I then immediately called my mother, halfway across the globe, to tell her about the dream she so longed to have and more importantly, to tell her to forward the kiss to her mother.

She answered the phone by saying: good timing, I’m at grandma’s, before I even had the chance to tell her about the dream. Admittedly, I knew she was visiting her mother once a week on the same day, so theoretically my brain could have staged this dream on that specific day, only today wasn’t it, it was supposed to be tomorrow, but my mother had switched days due to an engagement. I told her about the dream and she told it to my grandma and although neither of them believed in flying men, they had no doubt that the kiss was real.

To be continued next week…